1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a content distribution system, content distribution control apparatus, content distribution control method, content distribution control program and content distribution control program storage medium, and is suitably applicable to, for example, a computer network system that distributes content from a user personal computer (PC) to clients through a predetermined streaming server.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a computer network system, when, for example, content created by an individual are provided over the Internet, it is a general practice that the individual opens a homepage.
When the individual opens a homepage in this way, the user acquires a homepage creation program through a user PC, creates a homepage hyper-linked with a plurality of content based on the homepage creation program and stores the homepage in a streaming server of an Internet service provider (hereinafter referred to as “ISP”).
Then, the ISP provides a client who gets access over the Internet with the homepage from the streaming server and then provides, in response to clicking on an anchor on the homepage, content linked with the anchor.
The streaming server also stores moving images and voice, etc. in addition to still images as content uploaded from the user PC, and can thereby realize a live distribution by carrying out a stream distribution of live content, etc. made up of moving images over the Internet in response to a request from a client.
However, the computer network system in the above-described configuration has a problem that when a user wants content to be distributed to an indefinite number of client users, the user cannot be sure whether the content created by the user will always be selected by the indefinite number of client users and there is also a possibility that the stream distribution will not be executed for a desired number of client users.